The reassuring of an OIC economic development initiative in South East Asian region
WIEF-SEACO FOUNDATION DHAKA ROUNDTABLE
Published: 12:14 AM, 29 October 2019
by Muhammad Abdul Mazid
The Organiza-tion of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) is the second largest inter-governmental organization after the United Nations spread over four continents. The Organization is the collective voice of the Muslim world which endeavors to safeguard and protect the interests of the Muslim world in the spirit of promoting international peace and harmony among various people of the world.
South East Asian Co-operation (SEACO) Foundation and World Islamic Economic Forum (WIEF) Foundation jointly will organize a roundtable today with the theme, ‘Regional Collaboration: Transforming Economies’.
The WIEF-SEACO Foundation Dhaka Roundtable 2019 will addressthe challenges and prospects of Islamic finance and sukuk, insights into the future direction of halal industry as well as opportunities for infrastructure development. The final session at the Roundtable willintroduce SEACO, a regional partnership platform, which will link Bangladesh and Maldives in the Bay of Bengal with selected ASEAN countries through various initiatives to strengthen economic cooperation among these nations.
The World Islamic Economic Forum (WIEF)
The World Islamic Economic Forum (WIEF), the successor of the Organization of Islamic Countries (OIC) Business Forum, was established in 2005 due to very need to boost business collaboration between OIC countries, the intra-trade of which is negligibly low, at 2-3% of the world’s average.
The idea of forming WIFE was eventually mooted in the Declaration of the 1st OIC Business Forum,K.L. October, 2003, held in conjunction with the 10th Islamic Summit Conference, Putrajaya: ,
“We call on the 10th Islamic Summit Conference to urgently constitute a “Group of Experts” as resolved by the 9th Islamic Summit, Doha and the IDB to finance the holding of the meeting of the “Group of Experts” from the proposed Member States, which will recommend the modus operandi for systematically realizing the Sub-Regional Cooperation Arrangement and report progress to the 11th OIC Summit.”
Regional and sub-regional co-operation between OIC member states is, deemed a priority area for joint action for achieving intra-Islamic commercial and economic integration. The Plan of Action and the Dakar Declaration of the Sixth Islamic Summit had also resolved to strengthen measures in this regard.
Concurrently, a number of OIC Member states have developed various structured regional co-operation arrangements such as the Arab Common Market (ACM), Arab Magreb Union (UMA), Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS), West African Economic Community (CEMAO), Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC), Arab Co-operation Council (ACC), and Economic Co-operation Organization (ECO).However, there is no framework for similar institutional co-operation or socio- economic co-operation among OIC Countries in the South and South East Asian region.
The urgency of regional cooperation among OIC countries must be understood in the context of failed talks at the WTO level in concluding fair trade terms for developing countries. Developed countries in the West are adamant to impose strict restrictions on market access for the developing world, in which the OIC is part of. Thus there is an impending need for the Muslim world to increase cooperation among the member states.
The WIEF Regional Forum in Dhaka, Bangladesh
While the OIC champions political cooperation in the Muslim World, the WIEF strives for business and trade cooperation between countries in the Muslim world. The Inaugural Conference of the World Islamic Economic Forum, October, 2005 held a Petaling Jaya resolved:
“Therefore, the World Islamic Economic Forum, calls on the Governments of Bangladesh, Brunei, Indonesia, Malaysia and Maldives to call a Preparatory Meeting of the Trade Ministers and the Private Sectors of this region, with the IDB, ICDT and ICCI to give effects to the SEACO Resolutions of the 24th, 28th 29th ICFM’s and the 9th Islamic Summit, 2002, Doha within a time bound process.
The World Islamic Economic Forum further believes that establishment of a Sub-regional FTA in South and South East Asia, through the formation of South East Asian Cooperation (SEACO) Forum will complete the building blocks towards laying the foundation of the Islamic Free Trade Area (IFTA) and the future edifice of the Islamic Common market.”
The 2nd WIEF, Islamabad held in November, 2006, further resolved to: “Accelerate Regional and Sub-Regional Cooperation leading to the establishment of an Islamic Free Trade Area (IFTA).”
Thereafter in the 6th WIEF, KL, 2010, which was attended by People’s Republic of Bangladesh Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina, Republic of Kosovo President Dr Fatmir Sejdiu, Republic of Senegal President Abdoulaye Wade, Sultan and the Yang Di-pertuan of Brunei Sultan HassanalBolkiah, Republic of Indonesia President Dr. Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono and Republic of Maldives President Mohamed Nasheed. Mohd Najib Tun Abdul Razak, Prime Minister of Malaysia stated: “We need to think a new and more beyond our conventional framework.
This may require a new economic model for the region -if necessary, that is designed to meet the specific needs of the Muslim World.”
Under the above Declarations and Statements from the OIC summit leaders, the SEACO should bring about the desired integration among the participating states in this Region with the private sector closely associated with the respective governments in a PPP structure.
Being buoyant and enlightened by OIC Foreign Ministers’ Conference (Dhaka May 5-6, 2018) the SEACO Forum is contemplating to hold an WIEF Regional Forum in Dhaka, Bangladesh , preferably in January 2019 , which will be the first attempt to revive the SEACO initiative, poised to be the OIC’s first regional market to increase trade intensity in the Muslim World, to increase trade intensity in the Muslim World.
This Regional Common Market could be a bridge between SAARC and ASEAN, with 2 OIC countries currently members of SAARC and three of ASEAN. If successful, this Regional Common Market could ultimately be replicated in other OIC regions worldwide.
The Forum will highlight areas of potential public-private sector collaboration and joint ventures consider and propose to the OIC Governments in this region a step by step approach towards establishing a “SEACO-FTA” under OIC Framework, having a market of nearly 400 million consumers. It will be an attempt to articulate strategies for the stakeholders of this region to layout a comprehensive road map to achieving the objective of consolidating OIC regional economic cooperation.
Experts in regional economic development expect that the WIEF Regional Forum in Dhaka will create a stepping-stone to a higher level of cooperation among Muslim countries in the region. If SEACO is brought into being comprising Bangladesh, Brunei, Indonesia, Malaysia and Maldives, it will encompass an area of 2.5 million square miles, a population of approximately 460 million, a combined GDP worth US$ 477 million, and an average growth rate of 6%+ per an um.
Geo politicians prudentially observed that there is no geographic contiguity between the ECO countries and the proposed SEACO countries and only link being by sea. S.E. Asian Region which is home to nearly 500m Muslims if one includes the populations of Muslim in non OIC countries, in fact constitutes over 1/3 of the Global Ummah of 1.5 billion.
A SEACO regional economic co-operation arrangement would thus go a long in removing the impediments to trade and investment and connectivity within the S.E. Asia Region and provide a viable framework, which will lead to greater interaction between the private sectors, there by encourage OIC Countries in the region to fully explore their complementarities in trade investment, energy, logistics, connectivity and manpower exchanges.
It is highly commonsensical that SEACO could become ultimately a bridge between ASEAN and SAARC-creating a Mega Growth Triangle in the Bay of Bengal, as the World Economic Centre of Gravity makes a paradigm shift to the East from the Persian Gulf to the Bay of Bengal by 2050, underpinned by the One Road, one Belt initiative of China. SEACO may also be developed as a sub-regional entity under D-8, by just including Brunei and Maldives, facilitating a building block approach from Sub-Regional (SEACO) to Intra -Regional D-8 to Global (OIC) Ummah.
The writer is an Advisor to SEACO Foundation. Heis a former secretary to the Government of Bangladesh and former Chairman of South East Asian Federation
of Exchanges
Email:. mazid.muhammad@gmail.com
Click on below link to view the original piece of the article:–
The reassuring of an OIC economic development initiative in South East Asian region
